The technical bulletin here

http://www.dolphinsci.com/techbull.html

says, as you noted, that the cylinder to head sealing ring is eliminated,
the paper cylinder to block gasket is eliminated, and a new shim is
installed in place of the paper gasket.  Bus Depot's web site says they have
them, at $4.72 each.

I don't pretend to know why there were two shims under the cylinders unless
a previous rebuilder was trying to achieve a specific compression ratio.
Which leads us to a general statement I've made here from time-to-time:
given the age of all this stuff we're dealing with and the uncertain origins
of the parts and any "rebuilding" or "remanufacturing" they've been through,
it's probably a very good idea to cc the heads and calculate your own
compression ratios before slapping all the parts back together.  Then you
can order proper sized shims for the cylinder/block interface, which may or
may not be the same size as the 1.6mm shims the factory recommended in the
tech bulletin.

----------------------------------------------------------------
Tom Young
Lafayette, CA 94549
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----- Original Message -----
From: "Olin Bausback" <mountain-man@COX.NET>
To: <vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM>
Sent: Monday, September 26, 2005 3:47 PM
Subject: Aircooled '81 2L cylinder sealing ring questions

> I'm rebuilding my 81 Westy and came across a VW service bulletin which
says to leave out the thin aluminum cylinder to block sealing ring as well
as the head to cylinder ring and install a 1.6mm aluminum shim (071 101 341)
at the base of the cylinder instead (with no head ring).   VW no longer
stocks the shims - any ideas on where I could get them?
>
> Also, on the cylinder to block seal there were 0.78mm steel rings on the
bottom of the cylinders, followed by the thin 0.22mm aluminum sealing rings,
then the block.    Should these steel ones have been there?  I can't find
them in the Haynes manual and need to know if I should leave them in or not
if I can't get the shims mentioned above.